Just when you think you have worked out how to optimize your website to get the best ranking for you site for your favorite search terms, Google goes and changes the ranking algorithm! In a move intended to counter criticism for allowing content farm sites to rank above high-quality sites Google has anounced a change to its search engine to demotes ‘low-quality’ websites. Apparently the change will affect about 12% of Google search queries in the US.
According to an announcement on the official Google Blog, this update does not rely on the feedback received from the Personal Blocklist Chrome extension, which was launched a few weeks ago. The post by Amit Singhal, Google Fellow, and Matt Cutts, Principal Engineer notes that “If you take the top several dozen or so most-blocked domains from the Chrome extension, then this algorithmic change addresses 84% of them, which is strong independent confirmation of the user benefits.”
At the moment it is impossible to speculate how any of the changes made by Google will impact on any online business in the long term, but we will keep our finger on the pulse, and let you know what we find.
If you want to read the official Google Blog announcement click here